‘They won't even let me talk about San Antonio anymore’: NBA don Barkley says cancel culture has stopped him from making fat jokes

NBA motormouth Charles Barkley has blasted cancel culture and lamented the fact that he cannot joke about the "big ol' women down in San Antonio" and other larger females in his capacity as a basketball pundit.

Barkley has been known to discuss the "big a** women" of the Texan city for some years in his role as a popular TV pundit in the US.

But he has always made a point of claiming that it is a joke and pointing out that he loves his big fans. 

After a recent online piece laid into Barkley for "fat-shaming shtick", though, he claims that the show's producers have told him to put a lid on such humor.

"They won't even let me talk about San Antonio anymore," Barkley told The Fan.

"They're like, 'Charles, we got one lady [who] wrote an article.' I'm like, first of all, I didn't call anybody personally fat in San Antonio.

"I was just joking around and this one lady wrote this article... we've been having fun with this for probably 10, 15 years.

"You can't even have fun nowadays without these jacka**es trying to get you canceled and things like that."

At 58, however, Barkley claims that he is "trying to hang on for another couple of years until I'm 60 and then they can kiss my a**."

"I'm only working until 60... I've already told 'em that," he revealed. 

"I'm not working until the day I die, that's stupid. And if I don't have enough money by now, I'm an idiot anyway – so they should fire me anyway."

While the San Antonio jibes have been going on for some time, this is the second controversy that Barkley has been involved in for insulting the women of a certain place in the US this year.

In April, he commented that "Georgia [is] the only school in the world where they named their mascot after the women down there" – a reference to the local university's Bulldogs basketball team.

His co-host on the 'Inside the NBA' TV program, Ernie Johnson, said the remarks were "so totally uncalled for,” later adding that he wasn't "even going to dignify that with a response."

"Chuck don’t care about cancel culture," commented one fan alongside a laughing-crying emoji.

"They have been trying to cancel him since the 80s."